


A Generation's End

by Nikita



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Canon Death, M/M, Romance, Sad, double hanky alert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-05 23:53:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/729324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nikita/pseuds/Nikita
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I've suffered losses...no man can live as long as I and not suffer great pain as well as joy...  But in my advanced age I felt secure in my knowledge that I had already experienced the greatest pain I could know...that nothing left could truly touch me anymore...</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Generation's End

**Author's Note:**

> Double hanky alert! This ficlet is depressing as hell, but what can you expect with a challenge like this - 46. Write a story how McCoy reacts to Kirk's death in "Generations"!
> 
> As soon as I read this challenge I could feel McCoy's pain...

I'm an old man - I've lived through some amazing times. Seen, heard, and felt so much... I was a husband, a father, a doctor, an adventurer, a friend, and a lover...

I've suffered losses...no man can live as long as I and not suffer great pain as well as joy... But in my advanced age I felt secure in my knowledge that I had already experienced the greatest pain I could know...that nothing left could truly touch me anymore...

How little I knew.

He was alive.

He was alive all this time...waiting... How long did it take me to come to terms with his death? How long did I rage and demand that Starfleet investigate the incident further...?

He was alive...trapped in a state of being that even now I cannot comprehend...alive.

And he is dead.

Dead.

They ripped my heart out and crushed it before my eyes in the space of moments. He was alive...but now he's dead. 

Officially dead. Legally dead. Physically dead.

Dead - dead - dead.

I didn't think that word could hurt me anymore.

I was wrong.

All these years I lived. All these years I was dead inside.

All these years I could have...should have...done SOMETHING.

For all the times he rescued others...for all the times he refused to give up... Why did we give up on him?

He died bravely they tell me. Heroically. Saving the innocent from certain destruction...he was always so good at that. His death will be added to the history books - yet another heroic deed - a fantastical act...a wondrous occurrence.

He is dead. There is nothing wonderful in that...I do not want to answer the questions they try to ask me - do not want to relive his exploits yet again for the newest generation of young hero worshippers.

He is dead.

And as I lie down in my bed and pull the blanket up over my old and tired body I know I am ready to join him.


End file.
